Fight the Treatment Industrial Complex

AFSC-Arizona staff are amazing advocates for prisoners - and as such, are true blessings to our communities. Spend time on their site - lots of resources.

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NATIVE RESISTANCE AND THE CARCERAL STATE

Retiring Arizona Prison Watch...

This site was originally started in July 2009 as an independent endeavor to monitor conditions in Arizona's criminal justice system, as well as offer some critical analysis of the prison industrial complex from a prison abolitionist/anarchist's perspective. It was begun in the aftermath of the death of Marcia Powell, a 48 year old AZ state prisoner who was left in an outdoor cage in the desert sun for over four hours while on a 10-minute suicide watch. That was at ASPC-Perryville, in Goodyear, AZ, in May 2009.

Marcia, a seriously mentally ill woman with a meth habit sentenced to the minimum mandatory 27 months in prison for prostitution was already deemed by society as disposable. She was therefore easily ignored by numerous prison officers as she pleaded for water and relief from the sun for four hours. She was ultimately found collapsed in her own feces, with second degree burns on her body, her organs failing, and her body exceeding the 108 degrees the thermometer would record. 16 officers and staff were disciplined for her death, but no one was ever prosecuted for her homicide. Her story is here.

Marcia's death and this blog compelled me to work for the next 5 1/2 years to document and challenge the prison industrial complex in AZ, most specifically as manifested in the Arizona Department of Corrections. I corresponded with over 1,000 prisoners in that time, as well as many of their loved ones, offering all what resources I could find for fighting the AZ DOC themselves - most regarding their health or matters of personal safety.

I also began to work with the survivors of prison violence, as I often heard from the loved ones of the dead, and learned their stories. During that time I memorialized the Ghosts of Jan Brewer - state prisoners under her regime who were lost to neglect, suicide or violence - across the city's sidewalks in large chalk murals. Some of that art is here.

In November 2014 I left Phoenix abruptly to care for my family. By early 2015 I was no longer keeping up this blog site, save occasional posts about a young prisoner in solitary confinement in Arpaio's jail, Jessie B.

I'm deeply grateful to the prisoners who educated, confided in, and encouraged me throughout the years I did this work. My life has been made all the more rich and meaningful by their engagement.

I've linked to some posts about advocating for state prisoner health and safety to the right, as well as other resources for families and friends. If you are in need of additional assistance fighting the prison industrial complex in Arizona - or if you care to offer some aid to the cause - please contact the Phoenix Anarchist Black Cross at PO Box 7241 / Tempe, AZ 85281. collective@phoenixabc.org

Thursday, October 25, 2012

This is one of the few letters I've received from the women at Perryville prison this month - it came just before my mailingto them about asserting health care rights was confiscated and my communication with existing correspondents there virtually severed. This kind of thing that Judith describes is why prisoners riot - they're tired of being treated as less-than-human. Empowering people to assert their civil rights appropriately, provided that the channels are accessible and responsive, should help decrease prison violence, if anything.I contacted Richard Pratt, Director of the Health Services Division at the AZ DOC, inquiring about a reasonable accomodation that would allow Judith to go out for physical therapy. Any reasonably prudent person could see that the chances of her suffering harm from not getting that rehab are pretty good - why would the DOC not help her get there? His response was as follows:

"I have forwarded your concerns to our monitoring team in Perryville
to review the records for restrictions that may be in conflict with ADA..."

He said nothing about her particular circumstances, though, which is a way of avoid taking responsibility for solving the problem, so I suggested the following to Judith:

1. file an HNR requesting a new referral for physical therapy,

2. submit a grievance about the transportation policies requesting a reasonable accommodation to her disability,

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

My mail has been hung up for a few weeks now, beginning with a mailing I sent to women correspondents at Perryville prison about their health care rights. A copy of the latest version is below - all but one or two copies appear to have been intercepted by prison authorities, though. One of the men I sent the second of the two letters below to said his copy was seized by officers and marked "riot material". After not hearing back from over 70 prisoners I'd written to in the past few weeks, by this weekend I felt pretty sure that the DOC was intercepting most of my mail going into their prisons, and are preventing those who had previously corresponded with me from getting word out. Unfortunately, since Director Ryan still hasn't responded to the following email I sent him 5 days ago, I don't know if any of those allegations I've made are true. For all I know, I'm about to be arrested for attempting to incite a riot or for promoting prison contraband. Or perhaps the DOC just made a huge mistake by messing with my free speech rights and diverting the US mail inappropriately.

While
we're on the subject of rioting, I thought you should see these other
two letters yourself and tell me if they warrant confiscation as well.
I've hardly heard a word out of Perryville since mailing them to about
30 women there - nor much from the 40 men to whom I sent the one with
Donna's emails - and suspect that either these letters have also been
diverted from the intended recipients, or their voices are being
repressed. A similar problem has befallen one of your Botulism patients -
his mail from me about who victimized him and what he might be able to
do to assure his rights are protected has definitely been interfered
with, and he'll run out of time to exhaust his remedies and access the
courts if he's kept in the dark about his options much longer. I'm also
concerned about the possibility that his ability to advocate effectively
for himself right now could still be impaired by the neurological
damage done to him after your people at Eyman refused to get him to a
hospital for a week. I don't trust that they now have his best interests
at heart.

Are you aware of the escalating crisis of guys trying to get into
your Protective Segregation program because the gangs are totally in
control on medium and higher yards? The guys all are. Your prisoners
also have the right to know why
- after four months of filing HNRs or going through the grievance
process - they are still suffering with an untreated urinary tract
infection, or have gone without their Metformin since July, who is
responsible for that kind of thing, and what they can do about it.

You
have the duty to Arizonans behind bars and in the community alike to
assure that you are doing no harm to those people entrusted to your care
for rehabilitation, because 95% of them will someday have to come home
to the rest of us. We'd like them to return with better social and
employment skills than when they left, not come back to us more
disturbed or violent than they ever were before.

The men are already "rioting", by the way, according to Dr.
D'Angelo, because they are hungry and terrified of dying horribly due to
gross medical neglect in your custody. I also think the fear that one
is about to be assaulted if one doesn't strike first is contributing to
the escalating rate of vicious attacks on vulnerable prisoners over
things that previously would have gone unnoticed on the yards, and thus
creates some of your 805 backlog.

The women will be rioting soon without me too, you know. That's your doing, however, not mine.

The
men and women alike in your prisons are all tired of being expected to
shut up and disappear when they resist sexual violence or extortion, say
no to racism, and challenge the deliberate indifference of their health
care providers. Those allegations about Wexford include some of
criminal misconduct, not just the heartless greed that our ALEC-laden
legislature happily expected they were satisfying when they mandated you
to outsource the prisoners' health care for less...you didn't put up
much resistance or educate them about better options, as I recall. None
that I could see evidence of, anyway.

One way to reduce the level of violence in your prisons may be to
empower people to learn and use the law and civil discourse in a
constructive manner to protect themselves from harm instead of reaching
for a gun or a gang to alleviate their fears - the deepest of which no
one here talks much about, which is rape. I haven't even begun to look
at your PREA reports lately; is sexual assault and exploitation on the
rise, too?

Many prisoners are waiting to hear back from me on
issues related to their health and safety, Director Ryan; they write to
me begging for their lives. Please get with your lawyers and get back
with me soon. I need to know whether you have some rogue mailroom
employees absconding with my mail, or if what I've written to your
prisoners deserves to be suppressed because it's more dangerous than the
conditions that you've cultivated and are now allowing to fester.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Margaret Plews

Again,
no one but myself is responsible for the contents of this email or the
attachments. Be aware that it and any response it gets (or doesn't get),
is hardly going to be kept between us.

--------------------October 4, 2012 letter to the women of Perryville prison---------

October 4, 2012Please read all the enclosed material carefully; I'm sending it to all the good addresses I have for women at Perryville. The Orange Gazette needs to do the bulk of the work from here, though. Spread my PO Box if nothing else, and I'll send whomever writes to me the same materials as long as I am able to. The enclosed are also posted at the Arizona Prison Watch blog, where your families can download the letter as well as info about how advocating for yourselves as prisoners, and mail it to you themselves.If ever you were in a fight for your lives and real justice, it is now. It’s not just about you, either - you need to stand with the women suffering even more around you. I applaud those of you who have had the courage to do so already - facing certain reprisal. I know that if they don’t nail you now, they will once no one is looking at the prisons again.I took your complaints and letters to the Sun City/ West Valley National Organization for Women last month, and their program committee is inviting me to come speak about Perryville’s conditions and the health care crisis for their November meeting. So for October I need to be kept up to date with what’s happening there - both in the way of improvements or deterioration of the situation for each of you individually and on your respective yards. If you have copies of grievances and responses you can send me, even better. If you are willing to let me use your name and story publicly, please tell me - and be explicit if you would like me not to identify you as well… though don’t think your involvement in organizing with NOW will be a secret to the DOC if you write to me - they will no doubt be monitoring all of my correspondents, and their officers may repeatedly move you or search your cell to steal the evidence you accumulate against them. Your silence will not protect you either, though, as Audre Lourde once said. You each need to do what you have to do to survive your sentence, though. I respect that. You alone know what you can and can’t risk in there.If you do correspond with me, please remember that I am not an attorney or a journalist - I’m just an artist and freelance writer in the community - a civilian doing my good deed before I leave this earth. Nothing you send me is privileged information, and I don’t know if the first amendment would protect my sources the way it does for the mainstream media. I sure don’t have a corporate legal team behind me to protect any of us if the state tries to harass or punish those of you courageous enough to correspond with me. But I need that information in order to get help in there to you, and it must be current and verifiable. If victims of and witnesses to abuse, neglect, and criminal activity by state or contract agents are willing to send signed statements you’ll swear by that I can publish and read aloud to the women from NOW, it would make the most impact. Things often get worse before they get better when you are fighting people with this much power over your very right to survive. It may not even get better there before you leave - and some of you may die in the battle for women‘s rights. But the more of you who stand and speak out now, the safer it will be for others who come after you to keep up the fight, and really make a change from the inside out. You can’t count on the ACLU or the rest of us to rescue you - and we can’t do our part right without you.So, you know where to find me. Be patient but persistent if I am slow to respond directly to your individual letters - I run out of ink and postage and have to juggle crises of varying magnitude. But I am listening, and I have friends out here who care about Perryville’s prisoners as well. So please, if you can, write to me. Send me your poetry, too. And letters from your kids, if you want - these women need to know just who I am asking them to help and why - you need to be real people to them; touch them, please. They are willing to hear you.Let me know if any of this is contrabanded. There are two other pieces of paper enclosed - one is an AZ Republic Article from last week, and the other is an email to Chuck Ryan from Donna Hamm, both reporting on what’s really up with this BS with Wexford Health.In Solidarity,

Peggy Plews

-----update of October 2 2012 letter about health care rights----

REVISED October 15, 2012

AZ
State Prisoners:

Sending
the following letter to you is not Donna Hamm's doing – it's mine
alone. Many of you will need this information for evidence and to
guide your discovery for more if you (or, in the case of your death,
your family) decide to file a lawsuit about your rights being
violated. If you go that route, you also need an attorney – not
me.

That
said, please don't go threatening to sue your nurses and doctors or
accuse them of criminality or complicity – save the posturing for
others to do. That just pisses the wrong people off while you still
have no power and need their help. This guy D'Antonio proves there
are still some good people in the mix, so look for them and tell me
who they are when you find them, just like you tell me about the bad
guys. Don't chase the good ones away.

Even
if you think following the rules of engagement with the DOC will
yield nothing, you must file HNR's about your specific health
care needs or complaints according to policy, which you need to ask
to see if you didn't get a copy from me – don't take some guard's
word for it. If the response to the HNR is unsatisfactory, don't just
call home to get them to call Central Office or file another HNR
asking the same thing a different way: they will appease and stall
family and you will just lose your rights thinking you are getting
action that way.

Follow
the grievance process all the way to the top, or you stand no chance
in hell if you ever take any of these people to court to sue for your
constitutional rights. Follow the rule of law to the letter on this
matter, or you will lose your civil case even if the DOC and Wexford
cause you to lose your sight or legs, or ultimately your life. Make
sure your grievances reflect what you anticipate you may have to
fight for in court, too. If the grievance policy for health issues
has changed since Wexford took over, get it in writing and get it out
to me.

Please
report to me any DOC officer or health care employee who obstructs
your attempts to file any informal resolution or grievances, or
anyone up the chain of command who doesn't respond in a timely
fashion according to policy – I need names and dates and reasons
for the grievance you attempted to file. Also report anyone to me who
refuses to show you DOC policy that governs grievances and how you
are able to access medical care. Just don't tell any of them
you're reporting them, or you'll likely get punished for it one way
or another. Assert yourselves appropriately, but keep your heads down
and study up on your rights like mad – catch up with the SOBs later
in court, once you know how to do it right.

Please
remember that I am an artist and community activist – not an
attorney. I don't know anything about the law except what I've taught
myself while trying to help you folks figure it out. So, use the
reference guides I send you and the resources below, and share them
with others who need them too...

Donna
is a former judge and a professional criminal justice consultant, and
can help more with legal questions and strategy than I can, if you
can afford to hire her. She's been doing this for 25 years.

Donna
Leone Hamm

Middle
Ground Prison Reform

139
E. Encanto Drive

Tempe,
AZ 85281

Ask
the ACLU-AZ for a copy of “Parsons' v Ryan” – the class action
against the DOC for medical and psychiatric neglect and abuse of the
mentally ill in solitary. Also file a complaint with them if you
haven't already about your prison health care.

ACLU-AZ
PO Box 17148, Phoenix, Az 85011

The
National Lawyer's Guild will send you their complete Jailhouse
Lawyer's Handbook if you send them $2 in stamps, check or money
order. I can't print the whole thing up, but you need it like a bible
for the duration of your sentence. Ask family to send for it (it must
be mailed directly to you from the NLG), or write me if you have no
one – I'll find a sponsor to order one for you.

National
Lawyers Guild 132 Nassau Street, Rm 922 New York, NY 10038

Here
is the address to the AZ Medical Board. Request each of their
pamphlets and a complaint form – but again, don't tell Wexford or
DOC what you're doing, just do it. Be prepared to document
allegations well, though, or face real problems yourself.

All
of you need to stand together if you take these people on, don't
leave it to one or two prisoners, or they'll get picked off like
flies. You need to show each other solidarity, and be attentive
witnesses to staff misconduct when it goes down. Write statements
and have another witness them when you see things – just like the
guards write incident reports - and always send copies of your
statements and other evidence (HNRs, grievances, etc) out to someone
you trust – preferably to the loved ones who will have standing to
sue in federal court if you die from neglect. The DOC routinely
ransacks cells to steal and destroy evidence against them. Just don't
think you can engage in this without risks and retaliation – it
may get worse before it gets better – it probably will, so study
up.

Arizona
Prison Watch, by the way, is just the blog I write – not an
organization, per se. I have friends behind me, but not in high
places – we're all pretty poor and hated by the authority in this
state, no doubt. I am anti-capitalist and think the profit motive
undermines human rights. I hate the drug war and the war on the poor,
and the kind of mass incarceration we practice in this country has
been used to destroy communities of resistance as well as liberation
movements – I want to abolish the whole system and start over. I
believe the prisons are the front lines in the battle to save our
collective humanity. It's where the worst abuses occur because
society has already exiled and silenced you for your crimes (and
class, and race, and so on), and justified great harm to your lives.
I don't want to live in a state that encourages cruelty and
exploitation in my name, for my ”safety”. It's the public, not
the prisons, I most want to reform. How we treat our prisoners is a
reflection of our collective spiritual evolution, and I want this
world to move forward.

So,
I am here for as long as I am able, simply to serve as a
counterbalance to the overwhelming power of the state to silence and
oppress you, by giving you what tools I can to help you fight for
yourselves, and amplifying your voice. That's basically my mission.

Be
patient but persistent if we are working together on something
– I''m swamped with correspondence. And take care of each other in
there.

Peggy
Plews

Arizona
Prison Watch

PO
Box 20494

Phoenix,
AZ 85036

(this is all also part of that mailing. perhaps this is what they really fear will cause a riot...)

Yesterday,
Oct. 1, I received a telephone call from Dr. Lawrence D'Antonio, who
works for a contractor who provides professional healthcare workers
to Wexford. As you know, Wexford, in turn, provides all
medical care for prisoners within the Arizona Department of
Corrections. D'Antonio currently works at the Eyman
Complex/Rynning. He was originally supposed to work at
Meadows, but now only works at Rynning. He says the Meadows Unit
is a "lost cause." If I understood him
correctly, he believes there is no doctor currently assigned to
Meadows Unit and that the Clinical Center there is essentially
inoperative. He has been a doctor (D.O.) for 27 years. He
has worked for the contractor who provides doctors to Wexford since
about July 2012.

D'Antionio says that Dr. Tom Bell is the
Statewide Medical Director employed by Wexford. The Regional
M.D. for Wexford is Dr. Hector F. Garcia. He is Dr. Bell's
boss. Karen Grant is the Director of Nursing for Wexford.
D'Antonio refuses to converse with or take orders from Grant.
Grant was abusive, used obscenities with him, and was unprofessional
during their initial conversation. He believes that it is
ironic that only current physican at the Eyman/Rynning Unit
(D'Antonio) has no communication with the Director of
Nursing. He has advised his own employer that either Wexford
needs to obtain someone other than Grant for him to communicate with
or he will not work there at all.

He says "personnel
(medical) are leaving in droves." Grant was ordering
him to do things outside his training and outside of his
expertise. She was ordering him to see patients who needed
specialists; he is not a specialist. He says that Dr Bell
ordered that certain medications are to be stopped for
some inmates. When asked why the medications were to be
stopped, Bell stated, "Because they are prisoners."
He asked Bell, "Is this your own medical decison-making?"
Bell replied, "This comes from Wexford."

Karen
Grant has ordered D'Antonio to write prescriptions en masse for
patients whom he has not seen. He refused to do so, stating
that in most cases he needs to see each patient individually before
he can prescribe a medication. He says Wexford is sabotaging
everything by doing such things as excessive questioning of the
doctor ("for more information") when he prescribes a
medication. When he makes a referral for a patient to have a
procedure, obtain a specialist's opinion, have additional testing,
etc., Wexford has a procedure which they call a "collegial"
conference call. Their staff get on a conference call and the
vast majority of the time, they delay the additional procedure by
requesting "additional information" from the referring
doctor. This goes on and on, back and forth, so that the
procedure itself never gets done or is so delayed as to be
meaningless (or dangerous) for the patient.

He says that he
was told that all prior referrals (for specialists, tests, etc.) made
by DOC healthcare workers prior to July 1, when Wexford took over,
are cancelled, and will not be honored. Instead, the inmate is
required to go through the referral process all over again, thus
further delaying what might be life-saving diagnostic testing.
D'Antonio says that many of the referrals are "shelved"
and continuously cycled through the "get more information"
process over and over.

D'Antonio refers to the mistakes and
unethical conduct going on by Wexford employees as "staggering"
and "criminal." He says that while he does not
consider himself to be soft on crime or criminals, "they
are human beings and deserving of basic medical care." He
has restricted his exposure to liability for the type of care being
provided to inmates by limiting the days he will work, the hours he
works, and the units at which he will work. He says what is
happening at the Meadows Unit and throughout the Florence
prisons is a "disgrace."

The doctor says that there
are such people as what doctors refer to as "hatchet"
doctors or "administrative" doctors -- they work for a
corporation and have given up their ethics (and oath) to 'do no harm'
by accepting a huge paycheck just to go along with corporate policies
and directions. D'Antonio says there are doctors (or nurses)
such as this that work for Wexford.

He says that each time he
sees a patient, he must fill out a progress note. This is a
form. When he orders lab work, an x-ray or a prescription, each
requires a separate form. At the Meadows Unit, it was nearly
impossible to find the forms needed, thus delaying and complicating
the already dysfunctional process. He says chart work is
ignored and there is no review process. He was originally hired
just to do induction physical exams for incoming (new) prisoners, but
that he has ended up doing everything from emergency care, chronic
care, diagnostics, etc. and that they are so back-logged in reviewing
charts that there is no reasonable way that each patient's chart can
be reviewed in a timely manner.

He states that he has been
told by Wexford employees that, "We are forbidden from talking
about what happens here. . ." and that he has been advised,
"Prisoners have died at the Meadows Unit due to lack of care
since Wexford took over . . . ." (He was unable to provide me
any names or DOC #'s of inmates who have allegedly died at Meadows
Unit due to lack of medical care since Wexford took over on July 1,
2012).

He says that the Wexford formulary for approved
medication is "archaic." He gave an example of the
medication that Wexford has approved for hay fever. (I can't
spell it). He says this was a medication that was being phased
out in the 1980's (it was a medication that he would have taken
as a child) -- and that the standard of care in today's world
for allergies is an antihistamine and/or a nasal steroid spray.
He says Wexford approves a salt water/ocean spray which is so
outdated, it is laughable. So, when he writes a prescription
for a timely/updated drug (a "non-formulary" drug), Wexford
can't fill it (won't fill it) because it isn't in their formulary.
So, there is a huge delay for the patient in obtaining non-formulary
medication, and the formulary list itself is actually
responsible for delay after delay after delay for patients to obtain
a prescribed medication, including for serious medical problems.
He states that Wexford would likely claim that their formulary
medications are "great" and "adequate," but many
of their medications are simply not used anymore in today's real
world of medicine in the USA.

He says he works a 12-hour day
with no breaks and he even eats lunch while charting. He
works the hours by choice in order to get in his weekly hours in as
short a time as possible to get out of there as quickly as possible.
But the workload is so far behind, it would require a full team of
doctors to get caught up and would take a year.

He
is concerned because many of the inmates are complaining they
are not getting enough food and the doctor is concerned about the
weight loss he has actually observed. His says he has
heard comments from many people that the real reason for
the recent riots/disturbances at Tucson and Rynning is because of an
underlying tension or stress among the inmate population due to (1)
not enough food; (2) being denied medical care. The DOC
explained the reason for the riots to the media as "racial
disturbances."

Dr. D'Antonio has openly discussed with
Dr. Bell his concern that Dr. Bell could have a
work-related breakdown over his job. He is deeply
concerned about Dr. Bell's mental well-being and feels it is possible
that Dr. Bell may become "overwhelmed" by his job
duties as Medical Director. D'Antonio believes the various
relevant Arizona professional medical boards and nursing board should
immediately become deeply involved and investigate what is
happening. The Hippocratic Oath: Do no harm -- is
being violated directly. He says he is witnessing
"outrageous" medical neglect and actions contributing to
such neglect by staff.

When a patient is referred
for an outside professional test, procedure or consultation, the
referral goes to the Wexford "collegial board." He
has asked, "What happens if it (the referral) is denied?"
Dr. Bell told him, "Well, it goes back to the referring
doctor." D'Antonio said, "Well, what happens if I
refer the same patient a second time for the same procedure because I
obviously believe he needs it?" Bell replied, "Well,
then we fire you because you keep making referrals."

He
says many doctors and nurses have quit. About 9-10 doctors have
quit between the Florence and Eyman Complexes. Describing
the situation as "under-manned" or "under-staffed"
is a diversionary term by Wexford. The doctors who quit need
to come forward to explain the reasons why they quit. The
under-manned situation is a result of the very problematic things
that are happening.

D'Antonio says that what is happening in
the Department of Corrections with respect to inmate medical care is
"nothing short of outrageous."

He
will agree to an interview with the media or with the ADC Director,
but will only do face-to-face. He lives in Tucson.

Mr.
Ryan, on September 5, 2012, I wrote you an email expressing my
concerns about the care being afforded to inmates by Wexford, and
wondered why the company did not seem to be attempting to
especially impress the Department during the early stages of
their multi-million dollar, multi-year state contract. You
did not respond to this email. It now appears as though Wexford
sees the ADC as a cash cow for corporate profits at the expense of
the very care they supposedly are contractually, legally, morally,
and medically committed to providing. This cannot be permitted
to continue, and corporate assurances of corrective action are
fundamentally insufficient as a response to the level, nature, and
depth of the issues that now are emerging as a result of the
outsourcing of inmate medical care to Wexford.

Just
prior to the Sept. 5th email, I had notified you of a Wexford nurse
who had ordered a female inmate to lick a powdered prescription
medication from her own hand after the nurse had poured it into the
hand. The inmate protested because of the unprofessional and
unorthodox method of medication administration and ended up with a
disciplinary sanction and movement to another yard. It is
unknown if the nurse was sanctioned or terminated, but you did advise
me that Wexford had "retrained" their nurses in the proper
method of distribution of medication.

Now,
with the above serious information as provided to me, I have no
choice but to contact the relevant Medical and Nursing Boards of the
State of Arizona. Human lives are at stake.

While
we appreciate the recent well-written noncompliance letter
from Joseph Profiri, that letter does not go far enough.
For example, there is no mention that families can't get in touch
with or recieve call back response from Wexford about their loved
one's medical care. Families repeatedly complain to me that
Wexford's "hot line" is completely non-responsive.

It is my understanding, based on information coming
directly from Dr. Lawrence D'Antonio, that Dr. D'Antonio was escorted
off the Rynning Unit by the Deputy Warden of the Unit and a security
officer, after my recent email to you had been (apparently)
forwarded to Wexford. This is apparently the procedure
applied toward whistle-blowers by Wexford.

It
is also my understanding that Karen (or Caryn) Grant, Director of
Nursing, resigned very recently (since my email to you). I
don't know if her resignation is connected to the fact that when I
filed a complaint against her with the Arizona Nursing Board, they
advised me that there is no "Karen Grant" who is licensed
to practice nursing in the State of Arizona at this time, but that a
"Karen Grant" was licensed up until 1991. I believe
that impersonating a nurse is a felony in Arizona.

Meanwhile, I have learned some additional very disturbing
information from Dr. D'Antionio which, if verified as correct,
amounts to an EMERGENCY situation. The following information
cannot simply be passed along to the "appropriate personnel"
as you advised about my previous email. Each and every prisoner
who is incarcerated in the state Department of Corrections is
entrusted to your department's care and custody, and you and your
Department are ultimately responsible for their care, welfare and
safety, which -- of course -- includes providing the community
standard of care for serious medical needs.During
the time he worked at the Rynning Unit, Dr. D'Antonio personally
observed that some inmates are given incorrect medications. He
also observed that some inmates are receiving medications which are
contraindicated for other conditions that they have (for example; no
inmate who is a diabetic should take a beta-blocker, etc.). Some
combinations are drugs which have the potential for being lethal.
He also observed that some inmates are being given double
doses of prescribed medication, each dosage from a
different manufacturer with a different name. Once again, in
some cases, the double dose could be fatal or seriously
debilitating. He reported to me that he advised Dr. Tom
Bell of his observations, and Bell essentially shrugged him off and
did not seem to grasp the import of D'Antonio's concerns. As
Dr. Bell had previously stated, "They are just
prisoners."

Because you now are in possession of the
above information as related to me by a licensed doctor in the state
of Arizona and based upon his own personal observation, I believe
that you are obligated to order an immediate audit/investigation of
ALL inmate medical files for inmates housed at the Rynning Unit.
The investigation must be conducted by an independent qualified
doctor or doctors who are not connected to Wexford or to the
Department of Corrections in any manner. Wexford should pay for
the audit/investigation. Other units should be audited as well
because there is no reason to believe that these egregious mistakes
are isolated to the Rynning Unit only.

Again,
it is insufficient to simply pass this message along to Wexford.
This potentially dangerous and/or lethal information must be
addressed at once and I expect to receive a report of the findings in
a timely manner. A report that addresses these issues would not
have to reveal HIPPA protected information because a code number
could be assigned to each case. It is imperative, however, that
any incorrect medications, double-dose medications or contraindicated
medications must be identified at once; hopefully, prior to
an emergency situation induced by deliberate indifference or by
gross negligence.

Monday, October 22, 2012

This opinion piece comes from a prisoner doing time in the AZ DOC at ASPC-Lewis. He was courageous enough to offer his real name, but I want to see him get home safely to his family someday, so I'm posting this anonymously for him. The DOC appears to have silenced just about everyone else who's been writing to me, so thank you, EV, for your voice today.

I’m writing from within the confines of Arizona’s Lewis Complex Prison, where each day I become more and more aware that I’m becoming less and less human--banished to some perilous wasteland of diseased and neglected souls lost in the interests of corporate greed.

Welcome to the wonderful world of ADOC and Wexford Health Sources, Inc., the infamous Pittsburgh-based, private, for-profit corporation hired in July to provide healthcare to Arizona’s 42,000 inmates--a 3-year, 349 million dollar deal.

And July was the last time many of us ever went to medical.

Since then our health needs requests and grievances have gone unanswered, there exists a culture of indifference to inmate medical needs, including excessive delay in psychiatric evaluation, and duty of care violations rising to a level of gross negligence. In fact on August 27, 2012, Jane Nwadiuto Nwaohia, a Wexford nurse already under investigation by the state nursing board contaminated the insulin supply with a dirty Hep-C infected needle, then used the contaminated insulin vial to administer shots to 105 other inmates, causing an exposure incident that neither ADOC nor Wexford reported to the Health Department for a week. (And this only after an inmate's family contacted 12 News to break the story September 12.)

Inmate grievants, attempting to exhaust their administrative remedies, pursuant to the prison litigation reform act, have been met with shameless and blatant delay tactics designed to frustrate or eliminate potential lawsuits arising from such grossly negligent and admitted violations of basic infection control protocols by the nurse, since fired.

These inmate victims are people that I know and who I see everyday with families just like mine. We've gained national attention, not for our crimes, but for attempted suicides, deaths, and infectious disease outbreaks. Some guards walk around wearing latex gloves all day to avoid Staph and other infections and viruses in abundance at the Lewis complex wasteland. And who can blame them?

ADOC Director Ryan said some of those exposed to the Hep-C outbreak may have already been exposed (so it shouldn’t matter, right?). Wexford was reportedly fined $10,000. A 349 million dollar contract and a $10,000 fine- or $95.00 per inmate exposed to an incurable liver disease. And further exposures do cause harm.

What message does this send? My message is this: Wexford Health Sources, Inc. is a clear and present danger to all inmates everywhere and is a huge liability to all involved in their substandard practices.

In fact, the recent Arizona incidents are but a small fraction of the misery Wexford has caused nationwide. The Private Corrections Working Group, in Florida, has posted a Wexford “Rap Sheet” detailing the company’s gross negligence and substandard care across the nation ( privateci.org/rap_wexford.html ) and the Santa Fe Reporter (NM) did a 15-Part award-winning series entitled “The Wexford Files” (2006). Sfreporter.com.

Administrators at the Lewis Complex Wasteland are no less culpable in the continued indifference to inmate medical grievances, at times refusing to provide grievance forms, refusing to process a grievance due to time frames although it involved a serious condition, and staff indicating that the nurse contaminated the insulin supply on purpose All this under the supervision of Warden Tara Diaz, ADW Chris Moody, DW Kimberly Currier, ADW Barrios, and COIV Juanita Baca.

I’ve often wondered what becomes of our humanity when even the so-called “good people” allow their hearts to become cold. What becomes of the human spirit when its light is extinguished by the overpowering agenda of a multi-hundred million dollar powerhouse corporation., like Wexford, whose only motive is profit--no matter the cost in human dignity, suffering, disease, and even death?

I’ve been to the bottom and seen the worst in human nature, but somehow I still believe that we’re all fundamentally good. Regardless of where we are in our respective lives, we’re all entitled to basic human dignity and a measure of respect--even those in prison.

I call upon the good people who can, to take action in defense of those of us in the wasteland--each of whom have brothers and sisters, mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, and children of our own who live in your midst. It’s time to send a clear and present message to ADOC and their corporate millionaire friends who “win” hundred million dollar contracts to provide substandard and grossly negligent care to inmates whose mothers can be seen by all in tears on the evening news as they prepare to bury a son. Or a mother whose son’s DUI sentence may very well now become a death sentence (of course, Wexford did receive a $95.00 fine for that, which they appealed).

There must be a full scale legislative investigation into privatization of prison healthcare because what really matters is the bottom dollar.

As good citizens of Arizona, what should matter to you is that all the while we become less and less human. Many of us will become more and more like your next door neighbor.

Monday, October 15, 2012

This comes right out of the awesome National Black Newspaper, the San Francisco Bay View. If you have a loved one inside any state prison in the country, print this up and mail them a few copies. It's a follow-up to a September post that includes the original announcement.

Unity is a matter of life and death in all ‘hoods – in the prisons
and on the streets. The Youth Justice Council rallied outside the LA
County Men’s Jail at 10 a.m. on 10/10, the day set by the Pelican Bay
Prison Short Corridor Collective for the beginning of the end of racial
hostilities. – Photo: Virginia Gutierrez

In September, the Short Corridor Collective, prisoners confined to
the SHU in Pelican Bay State Prison, one of the first and harshest
examples of mass solitary confinement, sent out a historic call for racial hostilities to end in California prisons beginning Oct. 10.

Of the prisoners in the SHU, who are all “considered the most
dangerous and influential (prisoners) in the state,” these men in the
Short Corridor are “the leaders, what one authority called all the
‘alpha dogs,’” writes Nancy Mullane of KALW,
who managed to get approval for a visit to the SHU – and even an
interview with a SHU prisoner. In California, reporters’ access to
prisoners is largely barred by law.

In announcing their 10/10 rally, LA’s Youth Justice Council quote
political exile Assata Shakur: “If unity happens inside the walls of
prison, imagine the impacts it will have on our neighborhoods and
youth!” – Photo: Virginia Gutierrez

In a letter
to prisoner advocates, these so-called “shot callers,” who prison
officials say require isolation to prevent them from ordering prison
murders, have shown their true colors. Writing “on behalf of all racial
groups here in the PBSP-SHU Corridor,” they declare that “now is the
time for us to collectively seize this moment in time and put an end to
more than 20-30 years of hostilities between our racial groups.”

“Therefore,” they write, “beginning on Oct. 10, 2012, all hostilities
between our racial groups in SHU, ad-seg, general population and county
jails will officially cease.” With this call, prisoners who endure some
of the world’s worst punishment have disarmed their jailers – disabling
the most effective weapon in the Corrections Department arsenal: divide
and conquer.

“Beginning
on Oct. 10, 2012, all hostilities between our racial groups in SHU,
ad-seg, general population and county jails will officially cease.” With
this call, prisoners who endure some of the world’s worst punishment
have disarmed their jailers – disabling the most effective weapon in the
Corrections Department arsenal: divide and conquer.

“In conclusion, we must all hold strong to our mutual agreement from
this point on and focus our time, attention and energy on mutual causes
beneficial to all of us and our best interests. We can no longer allow
CDCR to use us against each other for their benefit,” they write. So,
with solidarity, the same men who led last year’s hunger strikes, which
involved 12,000 prisoners at their peak, intend to achieve the modest
relief they were promised then – promises still unfulfilled.

Prisoners respond to the call

When the Bay View published the call
to end hostilities, prisoner advocate Kendra Castaneda printed 100
copies of the story and mailed them to 100 prisoners around the state,
so that word would begin to spread before Bay View prisoner subscribers
received their October papers. She was determined to make a way around
the severe restrictions on prisoners’ ability to communicate.

A large, enthusiastic crowd, including prisoners’ families and
supporters as well as youth, turned out for the 10/10 rally in LA. –
Photo: Virginia Gutierrez

California prisoners, who are prohibited from writing to each
other, rely on phone calls, visits and letters from outside the walls
and on the Bay View and a few other publications for the news that
matters most to them. Most of the men in the Short Corridor Collective,
however, are allowed no phone calls, and many are denied visits as well.

And rumors reached us that the Corrections Department might ban the
October Bay View statewide for containing the call that would
effectively disarm them. We don’t yet know whether subscribers have
received their papers. What we have heard is that many prisoners’
letters to the Bay View are being confiscated.

Of the 100 copies of the call to end hostilities that Kendra mailed,
all appear to have been delivered except the 11 addressed to the very
same men who wrote it. On Oct. 12, she received 11 “mail stops,” notices
from the Pelican Bay gang unit claiming her letters violate California
Code of Regulations Title 15 with “plans that violate the law” and
facilitate prisoner-to-prisoner communication, even though she had
deleted all the signers’ names and prison numbers.

Rumors
have reached us that the Corrections Department might ban the October
Bay View statewide for containing the call that would effectively disarm
them.

Responses from prisoners who did receive her letters are beginning to reach Kendra, and here’s what they write:

This is one of 11 “mail stops” Kendra Casteneda received Oct. 12,
barring her letters containing copies of the Bay View story announcing
and including the “Agreement to end hostilities” from reaching the very
prisoners who wrote the agreement. This mail stop names Ron Dewberry,
better known as Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa. (Click to enlarge.)

From Gustavo Chavez: “The idea of this agreement going around is a
positive start to a new beginning for all inmates. If we could maintain
this valuable peace treaty within the prison system, why not work on
spreading the word outside the prison walls so that we may put an end to
the gang violence and work on becoming a bigger force?

“If we
could maintain this valuable peace treaty within the prison system, why
not work on spreading the word outside the prison walls so that we may
put an end to the gang violence and work on becoming a bigger force?” –
Gustavo Chavez

“Of course this movement will immediately be looked at as home grown
terrorism. We can’t allow such propaganda to interfere with our progress
to educate our youth. The whole system operates on scare tactics,
tactics that we shouldn’t fear.

“The challenges that lie ahead must be supremacy over the entire
system. We can’t allow our decisions to be uncertain, because
uncertainty won’t take us far. We also must implement principal to our
purpose so that we may understand the cause. When people lose focus,
things get ugly, and we all know who benefits from that!

“Last but not least, we/I know that rumors have been going around
about certain stuff, and supposedly everything is coming from the Short
Corridor. It sounds like the guards are attempting to disrupt the
agreement by spreading these rumors around. We all must be careful not
to fall into the guards’ web.
“I’m always prepared for the worst, especially when knowing I’m being
psychologically tortured day after day.” – In struggle, Gustavo Chavez,
E-45117, PBSP SHU D-8-121, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532,
written Sept. 26, 2012

In a separate personal letter, Gustavo writes on Oct. 7: “Kendra, a
lot of scandalous things are occurring up here. They have over 16
inmates from the main line on potty watch.
I’m constantly being threatened by the coward pigs. Their tactics are
aimed to disrupt what we are setting out to accomplish. You make sure to
continue riding strong against the enemy regardless of the amount of
times they try to bring you down.”

From Terrance E. White: “They’ve moved a lot of people over to Wasco
State Prison Ad-Seg Unit, and they’re still validating people but have
let non-serious incidents go back to the yard. That’s what I’ve
witnessed.

“And they didn’t try to deter our Black August celebration this year.
Here at North Kern State Prison, we had Southern Hispanics, Northern
Hispanics and a few whites participate in our exercising routines on the
yard (dog kennel) with us New Afrikkkans.

“We are
all also aware of the peace treaty that’s to start Oct. 10, 2012,
throughout the prison system and are all in agreement with it. It is
about time to take back all that has been lost and continue to press
forward in this struggle for liberation. They’ve had all us oppressed in
these conditions for far too long.” – Comrade T, Terrance E. White

From Heshima Denham: “We received the comments (from several
different sources) on the 10/10 cessation of hostilities and are in FULL
adherence/compliance with all three points. However, there does seem to
be some confusion on aspects of point 3 as it relates to the 10/10/2012
date, and we were wondering could we get some clarity from the main
reps at PB?” – Heshima Denham, J-38283, Cor-SHU 4BIL-46, P.O. Box 3481,
Corcoran, CA 93212, written Oct. 3, 2012

Prisoners’ inability to communicate leads to confusion

The confusion Heshima mentions appears to be reflected in an Oct. 13 story in the Los Angeles Times.
Prisoners apparently heard that a call had been put out by those who
had called last year’s hunger strikes and assumed it was for another
hunger strike. The Times reports:

“Corrections officials said they do not know why about 500 inmates
started refusing food Wednesday, the same day a prison ‘end to
hostilities’ was called by inmate activists who had orchestrated last
year’s mass hunger strikes.

“The fasting began at opposite ends of the state. Several hundred
inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison near the Oregon border refused meals
from Wednesday through Friday, but began eating again Friday night,
said Terry Thornton, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections
and Rehabilitation. About 300 prisoners at California Correctional
Institute in Tehachapi, north of Los Angeles, also began refusing meals
Wednesday. About 200 of them continued to refuse food Saturday, Thornton
said.”

This youngster dressed in stereotypical prison garb behind bars
dramatizes the encaging of human beings practiced on a mass scale in
California and throughout the U.S. Prisoners in solitary confinement
endure years and even decades of isolation in windowless “concrete
coffins” the size of a parking space, deprived of sensory stimulation,
human contact or a glimpse of the natural world – a bird, a tree or a
blade of grass. Imagine the strength of character that takes! – Photo:
Virginia Gutierrez

The Times’ story closes on an ominous note:

“Prison officials regard the reference to race [in the call to end
hostilities] as a synonym for the race-based gangs active in California
prisons, including the Mexican Mafia, Aryan Brotherhood and 415 KUMI.

“Molly Porzig with Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity said Pelican Bay
prison officials responded to the ceasefire by asking the 16 Short
Corridor inmates whose names appear on the statement to acknowledge gang
activity. She attributed the claim to a family member visiting one of
those inmates last week.”
This suggests that CDCR is trying to turn the call to end hostilities on its head and consider it evidence of gang activity.

It is
imperative that the truth be communicated to prisoners all over
California. We urge readers to print out this story and mail it to
prisoners you know.

To nip in the bud these efforts to confuse and criminalize prisoners
and stop their peaceful organizing, it is imperative that the truth be
communicated to prisoners all over California. We urge readers to print
out this story and mail it to prisoners you know. If you’re not
currently corresponding with a prisoner, look for California prisoners
from among the hundreds of pen pals listed in the Bay View.

The call to end hostilities is heard and heeded on the streets

Los Angeles’ Youth Justice Coalition (YJC) called for a “parallel
cease fire in the streets” to correspond to the end of hostilities
inside the prisons called by the Short Corridor Collective. Led by the
youth, a large, diverse crowd rallied at 10 a.m. on 10/10 outside the LA
County Men’s Jail.

In announcing their rally, YJC wrote: “Prisoners in Pelican Bay State
Prison’s Security Housing Unit (SHU) have announced a push to end all
hostilities between racial groups within California’s prisons and jails.
The handwritten announcement was sent to prison advocacy organizations.
It is signed by prisoners identifying themselves as the PBSP-SHU Short
Corridor Collective. Pelican Bay’s SHU was the point of origin for last
year’s hunger strikes which rocked California’s prison system, at one
point including the participation or nearly 12,000 prisoners in over 11
prisons throughout the state.”

As the crowd gathered for the 10/10 rally, a big banner greeted
them: “To the cops we all look the same! Unite LA! Why fight each other?
Fight for justice!” – Photo: Virginia Gutierrez

“We have the duty to fight for our brothers and sisters who remain
inside the walls of injustice and confined to a system that does NOT
work for our community,” they declared.

Photos taken at the rally that illustrate this story exude solidarity and hope.

The youth quote political exile Assata Shakur: “If unity happens
inside the walls of prison, imagine the impacts it will have on our
neighborhoods and youth!”

“If unity happens inside the walls of prison, imagine the impacts it will have on our neighborhoods and youth!” – Assata Shakur

Another rally was held in Riverside. The announcement on Facebook
reads: “We are calling on all communities in Riverside County to stand
in solidarity with all of our loved ones locked inside California’s
prisons and county jails. This press conference and rally calls on the
CDCR and local county sheriff’s departments to honor the call to end all
hostilities between racial groups.”
In the Bay Area, a panel discussion on the call to end hostilities
among other topics under the heading, “Alternatives to the Prison
System,” is set for Saturday, Oct. 20, 2:30 p.m., at the Niebyl-Proctor
Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave., Oakland. The topics are:

prisoners’ call for an end to hostilities, inside and in the communities

a critique of power’s criminality as revealed in the existence of prisons

Sunday, October 14, 2012

I've always thought that most people wouldn't be so afraid of an
anarchist version of the future if they knew what exactly that meant
about how we might "maintain order". We're so used to how things are
now, in this kind of society, that we have a hard time wrapping our
brain around other possibilities, which makes people even afraid to
question the wisdom of what we've practiced for the past few decades -
like mass incarceration and building more for-profit prisons.

There is room at the end of this article to talk more about the
concept of transformative justice (which maybe I should pickup on soon),
but I thought it was a really well-articulated analysis of anarchist
principles re: the prison industrial complex, and extremely
well-sourced. It's much better than anything I've tried to compose
myself in the past 3 1/2 years of doing this blog. I usually identify
myself as a "sympathizer", rather than a full-fledged anarchist - it's
nothing against my brothers and sisters in black. Other people can just
explain anarchist theory (which I've read shockingly little of) and the
ways it plays out in the real world better than I do.

Thanks to the author and this site Dissident Voice "a radical newsletter in the struggle for peace and social justice" for putting this out there...

This paper is a critique of how the state, the legal system, and
the criminal justice system function in American society, and calls for
an anarchist approach to how society should be organized that will
remove the oppressive frameworks we currently live under.

To support my arguments, I will first provide an overview of how the
criminal justice system works. From there I will offer an analysis on
why the criminal justice system is flawed, and the racially
discriminatory effect it has had on society. I will then discuss why the
disproportionate number of minorities found in prison and impoverished
in this country is directly tied to the contemporary ruling interests
that were preserved by the U.S. Constitution. Showing that the system is
inherently discriminatory, I propose an alternative method for viewing
society through anarchism. I will spend time debunking myths regarding
anarchism and explaining why it is a viable ideology. In the end, I will
propose a restorative justice approach to criminal justice that
requires neither the state nor the legal system.

Overview of criminal justice system

In theory, the function of the legal system, and the state is to
provide a structure that creates an environment for society that
protects individual and collective freedom. The intention of the legal
system then, is to provide an objective set of rules for governing
conduct and maintaining order in society. In order to cover all
potential conflicts, the law is divided into two forms: (1) civil law,
which are rules and regulations that decide transactions and grievances
between individuals; and (2) criminal law, which are rules concerned
with actions deemed dangerous or harmful to society as a whole, and are
prosecuted by the state.

Relevant to this paper, the criminal justice system is the method by
which society deals with individuals who violate criminal laws. It is
the means for society to “enforce the standards of conduct necessary to
protect individuals and the community.”1
This system is composed of three parts: (1) police enforcement of the
law; (2) adjudication of potential violations; and (3)
punishment/rehabilitation for criminal acts.
The state authorizes police officers to enforce the law and maintain
order. This permission allows the police to arrest individuals, and use
deadly force when the circumstances permit. Since police officers are
allowed to use their discretion in determining when there has been a
violation of the law, and when to use deadly force, they are trained to
be capable of assessing the situations they find themselves in, and
acting accordingly.

As a check on the power given to police officers, state prosecutors
are responsible for determining whether the charges have substance, and
if the individual’s case should go to trial. In the words of Michelle
Alexander, the prosecutor has the most power of any other criminal
justice official, and is the person that “holds the key to the jailhouse
door.”2 This adds a special responsibility for prosecutors, according to Chief Judge, Isaac Christiancy:

The prosecuting officer represents the public interest, which can
never be promoted by the conviction of the innocent. His object like
that of the court should be simply justice; and he has no right to
sacrifice this to any pride of professional success. And however strong
may be his belief of the prisoner’s guilt, he must remember that though
unfair means may happen to result in doing justice to the prisoner in
the particular case yet justice so attained is unjust and dangerous to
the whole community.3
If a prosecutor determines there is enough evidence for trial, the individual will be charged with committing a crime.

At trial, the adversarial system is used. This means the prosecutor
will present evidence, in addition to arguments, explaining why the
defendant is guilty of the alleged crime(s), and the defendant’s
attorney, who is either appointed by the state or chosen independently,
will do the same, except explaining why the defendant is not guilty. All
this is presented before a judge, and sometimes a jury, who are
regarded as objective third parties, and are responsible for determining
the guilt of the defendant.

If an individual is convicted of a crime, they enter into the custody
of the correctional authorities. An example of the stated role
correctional authorities and prisons play in the criminal justice system
is exemplified by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, which “protects
society by confining offenders in the controlled environments of prisons
and community-based facilities that are safe, humane, cost-efficient,
and appropriately secure, and that provide work and other
self-improvement opportunities to assist offenders in becoming
law-abiding citizens.”4
Prisoners can receive medical, educational, religious, and career
assistance to achieve the stated edification goals. Prisoners can be
released before fulfilling their required time in prison by being placed
on parole, which means they are released back into society with certain
restrictions on their freedom. Ultimately, the objective of the
correctional authorities and prisons is to protect society from
criminals, while also providing rehabilitation to them so that they
leave prison better than when they entered.

In its entirety, the criminal justice system is structured to deliver
justice in a fair manner that upholds the ideals America holds for
itself.

The problem — the illusion

Despite the stated intent of the criminal justice system,
there are clear, systemic problems with how it functions that not only
call its existence into question, but also the legal system that
produced it as well. At the core of the problem is the fact that
“justice” is determined by the state, and not the individuals involved.
Worsening this is the fact that the origin of the state was built on
discriminatory ideals. This has resulted in a criminal justice system
that does not serve the people, but works to maintain oppressive and
discriminatory, governmental authority.

The victims and alleged offenders have little, to no, say in the
determination of justice throughout the criminal process. The state
replaces the actual victim as the injured party for trial, and seeks
justice based on its own standards. Defendants are advised to remain
silent, and to allow their attorney to do most of the speaking for them.
In describing this phenomenon, Alexandra Natapoff, writes:

The United States’s criminal justice system is shaped by a
fundamental absence: Criminal defendants rarely speak. From the first
Miranda warnings through trial until sentencing, defendants are
constantly encouraged to be quiet and to let their lawyers do the
talking. And most do. Over ninety-five percent never go to trial, only
half of those who do testify, and some defendants do not even speak at
their own sentencings. As a result, in millions of criminal cases often
involving hours of verbal negotiations and dozens of pages of
transcripts, the typical defendant may say almost nothing to anyone but
his or her own attorney.5 [...]

Defendant silence also has systemic implications for the integrity of
the justice process. In our democracy, individual speech has
historically been seen as an antidote to governmental overreaching.
Criminal defendant speech is perhaps the quintessential example of the
individual defending his or her life and liberty against the state. Yet
silent defendants rarely express themselves directly to the government
official deciding their fate, be it judge or prosecutor, and are often
punished more harshly when they do. The justice system assumes that
conversations between counsel and clients, and counsel’s own speech on
behalf of clients, fulfill the personal needs of defendants as well as
systemic requirements that defendants be “heard.” Yet most defense
counsel are overworked, appointed counsel with insufficient time to
spend communicating with their clients or fully exploring their clients’
personal stories.6

Together, the practice of “representation” does not form an honest
quest for justice, since it silences the only individuals that are truly
capable of determining it.

Although America’s legal system has determined that justice is most
effectively administered through the adversarial system, the reality of
the process shows that this is a contrived conclusion. The adversarial
system relies on prosecutors to “do justice,” and for defense attorneys
to be “zealous advocates” for their clients, relying on both sides to
present their strongest arguments, so that a third-party trier of fact
can make the best decision.7
This system relies on justice being equated with victory, which
encourages both sides to be as uncooperative as possible with each
other.

In living up to their roles as zealous advocates for their clients,
and encouraged by the adversarial system, defense attorneys can employ a
number of tactics to win cases, that do not help the trier of fact make
an informed decision. In his essay outlining the problems with these
tactics, labeled “aggressive defense,” William H. Simon, provides a few
troublesome examples:

Defense lawyers sometimes have opportunities to draw out
and delay cases, for instance, by deliberately arranging their schedules
to require repeated continuances. This can have the advantage of
exhausting prosecution witnesses and eroding their memories.

Defense lawyers are sometimes asked to present perjured testimony by
defendants. They sometimes find they can benefit their clients by
impeaching the testimony of prosecution witnesses they know to be
truthful. And they sometimes can gain advantage by arguing to the jury
that the evidence supports factual inferences they know to be untrue.
[...]

Lawyers occasionally find it advantageous to disclose or threaten to
disclose information that they know does not contribute to informed
determination on the merits because such disclosure injures the
prosecution or witnesses.8

While these tactics are permissible, each exemplifies how the
adversarial system promotes the goals of the individual defendant over
that of overall justice.

Prosecutors are also encouraged by the adversarial system to give
precedence to winning rather than obtaining actual justice. As a
representative of the state, prosecutors must be conscious of how the
public perceives their decisions. To ensure this, almost everywhere in
America, (except Alaska, Connecticut, New Jersey, and the District of
Columbia) the job of chief prosecutor is determined by an election.9
To secure election, or reelection, prosecutors often campaign on how
“tough” they are on crime, something that is usually demonstrated by the
number of convictions a prosecutor has made. This equates convictions
with justice, which consequently, creates an imbalance in the pursuit of
justice, as it implies justice lies on the side of the prosecutor, by
default, and not the defendant. In arguing that judges should not be
elected, Justice John Paul Stevens said, “A campaign promise to ‘be
tough on crime,’ or to ‘enforce the death penalty,’ is evidence of bias
that should disqualify a [judicial] candidate from sitting in criminal
cases.”10
The same argument can be made for prosecutors as well. Thus, in order
to show proficiency, prosecutors are often encouraged to convict
individuals. However, the argument that convictions equal justice is a
fallacy. If this were true, the rate of recidivism would be decreasing,
yet it is increasing. According to a 2006 report released by the
bipartisan Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons, within
three years of their release, 67% of former prisoners are rearrested and
52% are re-incarcerated.11
Assisting the “convictions = justice” belief are economic incentives
that permit individuals and corporations to profit from the number of
prisoners a jail has. This is commonly referred to as the “private
prison-industrial complex.” Between 1999 and 2010, the use of private
prisons increased by 40% at the state level, and by 784% in the federal
prison system.12
This rise correlates with an increase in revenues as well: Corrections
Corporation of America and the GEO Group, the two largest private
prison companies, made over $2.9 billion combined in 2010.13
Explaining how these profits have been spent, the Justice Policy
Institute states, “[a]s revenues of private prison companies have grown
over the past decade, the companies have had more resources with which
to build political power, and they have used this power to promote
policies that lead to higher rates of incarceration.”14
Thus, a cycle exists where private prison facilities influence the
criminal justice system through political and economic means,
encouraging the flawed belief that convictions equal justice.

The confluence of economic and political motives for obtaining more
convictions has had tremendously negative effects on society, and has
helped usher in a period of “mass incarceration.” According to the
International Centre for Prison Studies, the United States has the
highest incarceration rate per 100,000 people of the national
population, than any other country in the world.15
A New York Times article described the situation succinctly, “[t]he
United States has less than 5 percent of the world’s population. But it
has almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners.”16
Furthermore, this period of mass incarceration has illuminated the
racist character of America’s legal system. According to the Bureau of
Justice Statistics, as of December 31, 2010, state and federal
correctional authorities had jurisdiction over 1,612,395 prisoners,
while a total of 7.1 million people were under the supervision of adult
correctional authorities.17
Of the 1.6 million prisoners, 588,000 identified as Black, and 345,900
identified as Hispanic, representing 36% and 21%, respectively, of the
prison population.18
This is alarming since, according to the 2010 U.S. Census, Blacks make
up 12.6% of the American population, and Hispanics constitute another
16.3% of the population.19
Making the imbalance clearer, the estimated number of inmates held in
custody in local, state, or federal prisons per 100,000 U.S. citizens,
for Blacks, Hispanics, and Whites, respectively, is the following:
4,607; 1,908; and 769.20 This means Blacks are nearly 6 times as likely as Whites to be in prison. Paul Butler writes:

Imagine a country in which more than half of the young
male citizens [referring to Blacks] are under the supervision of the
criminal justice system, either awaiting trial, in prison, or on
probation or parole. Imagine a country in which two-thirds of the men
can anticipate being arrested before they reach age thirty. Imagine a
country in which there are more young men in prison than in college.21

The racial disparity is also present in death penalty cases.
According to the Equal Justice Initiative, “[m]ore than half of the over
3300 people on death row nationwide are people of color; nearly 42% are
African American. Prominent researchers have demonstrated that a
defendant is more likely to get the death penalty if the victim is white
than if the victim is black.”22
And according to Amnesty International, a 1990 report by the
non-partisan U.S. General Accounting Office found, “a pattern of
evidence indicating racial disparities in the charging, sentencing, and
imposition of the death penalty.”23
As a result, the effect of criminal laws, their enforcement and
prosecution, has disproportionately placed more Blacks and Hispanics in
jail than in the nation’s history.

Causes for the discriminatory effects of the criminal justice system

The disproportionate number of racial minorities involved
in America’s criminal justice system is not by chance, but intent, as
it is a consequence of the racist and classist interests the U.S.
constitution was designed to protect. Starting in the mid-15th century,
after the violent acquisition of land belonging to long-established
indigenous communities, Americans and Europeans engaged in the cruel
transportation of over 11 million Africans for over 450 years.24
The African slave trade helped build America into one of the most
powerful countries in the world, but also created a patriarchal society
that reified racial discrimination by the creation of racial identities.
These racial identities were used by the rich, White elites to create
artificial divisions amongst the masses to pit them against each other,
and not their rulers. The Populist leader from Georgia, Tom Watson, in
calling for racial unity, said:

You are kept apart that you may be separately fleeced of
your earnings. You are made to hate each other because upon that hatred
is rested the keystone of the arch of financial despotism which enslaves
you both. You are deceived and blinded that you may not see how this
race antagonism perpetuates a monetary system which beggars both.25

The rich, white men that had obtained economic and political power
throughout the colonies utilized the opportunity the Constitutional
Convention provided to ensure their power was maintained with the
formation of the new country. Writing about the findings of fellow
historian Charles A. Beard, Howard Zinn writes:

Beard applied this general idea [that the rich must
either control the government directly, or control the laws by which the
government operates] to the Constitution, by studying the economic
backgrounds and political ideas of the fifty-five men who gathered in
Philadelphia in 1787 to draw up the Constitution. He found that a
majority of them were lawyers by profession, that most of them were men
of wealth, in land, slaves, manufacturing, or shipping, that half of
them had money loaned out at interest, and that 40 of the 55 held
government bonds, according to the records of the Treasury Department.

Thus Beard found that most of the makers of the Constitution had some
direct economic interest in establishing a strong federal government:
the manufacturing needed protective tariffs; the moneylenders wanted to
stop the use of paper money to pay off debts, the land speculators
wanted protection as they invaded Indian lands; slaveowners needed
federal security against slave revolts and runaways; bondholders wanted a
government able to raise money by nationwide taxation, to pay off those
bonds.

Four groups, Beard noted, were not represented in the Constitutional
Convention: slaves, indentured servants, women, men without property.26

Summarizing the constitution then, Zinn writes:

The Constitution, then, illustrates the complexity of the
American system: that it serves the interests of a wealthy elite, but
also does enough for small property owners, for middle-income mechanics
and farmers, to build a broad base of support. The slightly prosperous
people who make up this base of support are buffers against the blacks,
the Indians, the very poor whites. They enable the elite to keep control
with a minimum of coercion, a maximum of law–all made palatable by the
fanfare of patriotism and unity.27

Those with power and influence, who had benefited from the use of
slaves as a means of achieving economic and political power, helped
ingrain slavery into their respective legal systems and cultures. Thus,
representatives, especially from Southern states, had a strong interest
in preserving slavery, and would not have agreed to join the union
without a constitutional protection for it. This protection is exhibited
by the original sections of the Constitution located at: Article 1,
Section 2, Clause 3 (recognizing the “three-fifths compromise”); Article
1, Section 9, Clause 1 (permitting the continuance of the slave trade
until 1808); and Article 4, Section 2, Clause 3 (protection for the
Fugitive Slave Act).

While legislation to abolish the slave trade became law in 1808, some
state governments enacted Black Codes, or laws to regulate the
institution of slavery and to place further restrictions on the liberty
of Blacks. The Supreme Court did nothing to abolish slavery, or the
racist laws, in fact, it thwarted an attempt by some Northern states to
limit slavery, through the Missouri Compromise, by nationalizing the
practice with its decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford.28
The issue of slavery ultimately contributed to the outbreak of the
Civil War, and the eventual passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th
Amendments in 1865, 1868, and 1870, respectively (prohibiting slavery
except as punishment for committing a crime, guaranteeing equal
protection for all citizens, and prohibiting the denial of the right to
vote based on race, respectively). However, the intent in maintaining a
racially divided society persisted, as state governments implemented
“Jim Crow” laws that segregated Blacks to a separate, and second-class
citizenship. The Supreme Court again did nothing to repeal these laws
until its decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka over 80 years later in 1954.29
The Civil Rights Movement followed in the 1960s and 1970s and helped
remove many of the overt forms of racial discrimination the legal system
and federal government had maintained, but regardless of these changes,
legally sanctioned racial discrimination has endured.
Now, it operates
in covert and institutionalized ways that can be shown through the
impact of governmental policy. The government’s “War on Drugs” has
become the most recent, post-Civil Rights Movement policy to continue
the racial discrimination and exploitation of minorities in America.
While the term “War on Drugs” was initially used by President Richard
Nixon, it was under the Presidency of Ronald Reagan when it became
heavily enforced. The purported purpose of the “war” was to reduce the
illegal drug trade, by implementing policies that discouraged the
production, distribution, and consumption of illegal drugs. This
included imposing restrictive penalties on an individual’s liberties for
committing drug-related crimes (i.e., losing the right to vote, denial
of public benefits), and harsher sentencing guidelines (i.e., “three
strikes laws,” mandatory minimums).

Although the appearance of the effort appears racially neutral, its
enforcement has had a clear racial bias. Terming the initiative the “New
Jim Crow,” Michelle Alexander explains that, “[a]s of 2004, more
African American men were disenfranchised (due to felon
disenfranchisement laws) than in 1870, the year the Fifteenth Amendment
was ratified …”30 Illustrating the racial bias of this, Alexander continues:

This war has been waged almost exclusively in poor
communities of color, even though studies consistently show that people
of all colors use and sell illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates. In
fact, some studies indicate that white youth are significantly more
likely to engage in illegal drug dealing than black youth. Any notion
that drug use among African Americans is more severe or dangerous is
belied by the data. White youth, for example, have about three times the
number of drug-related visits to the emergency room as their African
American counterparts.31

Another indicator of the racial bias within the initiative can be
shown through the difference in sentencing guidelines. In 1986, the U.S.
Congress passed laws that created a 100:1 sentencing disparity for the
possession or trafficking of crack, in comparison to the penalties for
trafficking powder cocaine, which exhibits discrimination since Blacks
are more likely to use crack than powder cocaine, a substance that is
predominantly used by Whites.32
Compounding this further are the revelations journalist Gary Webb
uncovered on how the Nicaraguan rebel group, the Contras, who were known
for drug trafficking, were assisted by the U.S. government in
distributing crack cocaine in Los Angeles, California to fund weapons
purchases.33
Thus, the undisguised racist laws and policies that targeted Blacks
after the formation of the Constitution have continued, just in a less
overt fashion.

The history of the plight of other minorities under oppressive laws
and governmental policies should not go unmentioned. Latinos have been
targeted through anti-immigrant laws, termed “Juan Crow,” that have had
similar, but different effects on Latinos as Jim Crow did on Blacks.34
Native Americans are also disproportionately represented in the
criminal justice system since they are incarcerated at a rate 38% higher
than the national per capita rate.35
Muslims, especially after the September 11th events, have been
subjected to racial profiling and surveillance by local and federal
authorities, similar to how the Japanese, and Asians generally, were
persecuted before and during World War II. Furthermore, the government’s
practice of discriminating against groups based on racial identities is
exemplified by its use of data obtained by the U.S. Census and the
policies it has created.36
Encapsulating the history of America’s legal system with the impact
it has had on society, the conclusion can be drawn that it has
successfully achieved the objectives its creators intended: a
patriarchal, plutocracy ruled by Whites. The gap in equality on wealth,
health, education, and employment between Blacks and Whites has
continued to expand, further demonstrating the bias inherent in the
construction of American society.37
Thus, a new approach to how we live and interact with each other is
desperately needed. One where our interconnectedness is valued, and
where society nurtures everyone’s existence. This requires a culture
that focuses on anti-oppressive structures, and has the goal of
collectively liberating all people. Luckily, such a vision exists, and
it is called anarchism.

Introduction to anarchism

The word “anarchism,” derived from the Greek root “anarchos,” means
“without authority,” and according to the Encyclopedia Brittanica, its
central ideals are freedom, equality, and mutual aid.38
Despite this, in modern popular society, anarchism is surrounded by
stigma and taboo, and invokes images of social chaos, in which terrorism
is the prevailing means of establishing law and order, making anarchism
seem both impractical and undesirable. However, through the fog of
misperception and obscurity, lies a sociopolitical doctrine that
challenges some of our deeply held assumptions on what the relationship
between the individual and society can be, and calls us to work towards
creating a truly free and cooperative society.

Behind some of the constructions of anarchism as a violent ideology
are events that transpired between the years of 1890 and 1901. During
this time period, individuals that identified as anarchists killed
several ruling figures, including U.S. President William McKinley, King
Umberto I of Italy, and Sadi Carnot, the President of France.39
These are certainly extreme acts, but it is unfair, and too simple to
ascribe these actions to all anarchists without an investigation into
the circumstances surrounding each event, or consideration for the
diversity of thought and tactics within anarchism itself. Such an
investigation is beyond the scope of this paper, but suffice it to say,
the use of violence, as a means to justify the ends anarchism seeks, is
not a universally accepted tactic.

Another argument used to discredit anarchism is its perceived
impracticality and lack of application outside of “non-primitive”
societies. Generally, “primitive” societies are distinguished from
modern societies because of an absence of an institutionalized
government-like authority. Due to this distinction, “primitive”
societies are considered irrelevant to discussions surrounding
present-day social issues.
Anarchist anthropologist, David Graeber, provides an alternative lens to view this dichotomy through his book, Fragments of An Anarchist Anthropology.40
Graeber writes that the popular American understanding of how human
society has developed is that it has followed a linear path, beginning
primitive and becoming more advanced and complex over time. Graeber
explains that the anthropological record does not support this
conclusion, using three egalitarian cultures, the Piaroa, Tiv, and
Malagasy, as examples.41 Graeber writes:

… we [anthropologists] have been trying for decades now
to convince the public that there’s no such thing as a ‘primitive,’ that
‘simple societies’ are not really all that simple, that no one ever
existed in timeless isolation, that it makes no sense to speak of some
social systems as more or less evolved.42

Author Walter Cruttenden also takes time to dispel this myth, writing:

The leap was made: If Darwin had evidence that physical
organisms adapt to fit their environment (evolve), then society, even
over short periods, must evolve in the same linear fashion. In other
words, if evolution existed in physical development, it must also play a
role in societal and cultural development within humanity. This was
very appealing to the intellectuals of post-Renaissance Europe as it
justified a superior attitude toward less complex societies.43

Everywhere in the world, it seems, archaeological digs are reshaping
our view of the distant past. Not only are these findings revealing that
civilizations were older than once thought, but they are showing that
man was smarter and more progressive.44
Based on this, Graber asks that we engage in a “thought experiment”:

What if, as a recent title put it, ‘we have never been
modern’? What if there never was any fundamental break, and therefore,
we are not living in a fundamentally different moral, social, or
political universe than the Piaroa or Tiv or rural Malagasy? […]
Let us imagine, then, that the West, however defined, was nothing
special, and further, that there has been no one fundamental break in
human history. No one can deny there have been massive quantitative
changes: the amount of energy consumed, the speed at which humans can
travel, the number of books produced and read, all these numbers have
been rising exponentially … The West might have introduced some new
possibilities, but it hasn’t canceled any of the old ones out.45

Without a basis for disregarding the social organization of
“primitive” societies, anarchism remains a relevant sociopolitical
doctrine.

While anarchism’s critics may concede that it is conceivable, they
may still argue it is not the best way of structuring society. This
position is exemplified by the thoughts of French Revolution thinker,
Jacques-Pierre Brissot. Brissot, in denouncing his political rivals, the
Enragés, accused them of advocating anarchy, warning that without the
rule of law and government, there could be no way of delivering justice
within society.46
This sentiment is exemplified modernly in Paul Butler’s bold essay,
“Racially Based Jury Nullification: Black Power In The Criminal Justice
System.”47
In Butler’s essay, he calls for Blacks to exercise jury nullification
in particular circumstances as a way of protesting the unfair practices
of the criminal justice system. Although Butler calls for the
undermining of the legal system, he ensures that readers do not confuse
his ideas as “encouraging anarchy” by explicitly stating so (“I am not
encouraging anarchy.”48 ). A logical assumption of Butler’s reasoning is that anarchy would be more problematic than reform.

Anarchism’s absence from mainstream America’s discussions should not
reflect poorly on the ideals it promotes. In the opinion of anarchist
author, John Zerzan, anarchism is about, “eradicating all forms of
domination. This includes not only such obvious forms as the
nation-state, … and the corporation, … but also such internalized forms
as patriarchy, racism, and homophobia.”49
“Domination” occurs in relationships where there is an unequal
distribution of power, allowing the dominator(s) to exert their will
over others. Being subject to domination causes mental and physical
oppression, both of which obstruct human growth. For this reason,
hierarchy is viewed negatively by anarchists, and instead, horizontal
structures, dependent upon collaboration are encouraged. According to
Anarchist writer, David Wieck, anarchism represents:

… a kind of intransigent effort to conceive of and to
seek means to realize a human liberation from every power structure,
every form of domination and hierarchy. Correlative with this negation
is the positive faith that through the breakdown of mutually supportive
institutions of power, possibilities can arise for noncoercive social
cooperation, social unity, specifically a social unity in which
individuality is fully realizable and in which freedom is defined not by
rights and liberties but by the functioning of society as a network of
voluntary cooperation. [...]

We are premising a society in which people have stopped living in
fear of one another, in which gross violence, hatred, and contempt for
life have become uncommon, in which alienation of person from person
seldom reaches the malignant extremes to which we are accustomed.50

Thus, anarchism does not advocate violence or mayhem, but rather
calls for the liberation of everyone by removing oppressive social
structures and practices from within our communities.

The vision anarchism has for society directly challenges a number of
the core assumptions and principles held by mainstream America. For one,
anarchists believe the current legal system and the authorization it
provides for governmental and state power is both harmful and
unnecessary.

In theory, the government is supposed to be of, for, and by the
people, but the reality of its function has only ensured the existence
of a ruling class, whose power and interests are perpetually preserved
by the system of governance. David Graeber describes the state as having
a dual character, where it is viewed as an institutionalized form of
extortion by communities that seek to retain some degree of autonomy,
while also appearing as a “utopian project in the written record.”51
Despite its idealistic aura, Peter Kropotkin writes that, “…
Anarchists have often enough pointed out in their perpetual criticism of
the various forms of government, that the mission of all governments,
monarchical, constitutional, or republican, is to protect and maintain
by force the privileges of the classes in possession …”52
Essentially, the power a community naturally has to rule itself, is
given to a higher authority, the state, to govern on the community’s
behalf. This opens the community to the abuses of power that result from
hierarchical relationships. Additionally, the community’s reliance on
the state to govern its affairs diminishes the community’s own power,
making it, and its members, subservient to the state. This reliance on
the state and the legal system creates an indirect way of resolving
conflict. Rather than individuals settling disputes amongst themselves,
they rely on impersonal laws to find a solution. To this point,
Kropotkin writes:

[Quoting French jurist Dalloy] “… legislation is expected
to do everything, and each fresh law being a fresh miscalculation, men
are continually led to demand from it what can proceed only from
themselves, from their own education and their own morality.” In
existing States a fresh law is looked upon as a remedy for evil. Instead
of themselves [the populace] altering what is bad, people begin by
demanding a law to alter it.53

Allowing officials of the state to fill positions of power and
determine policy for the community is problematic for the following
reason:

The notion of “policy” presumes a state or governing
apparatus which imposes its will on others. “Policy” is the negation of
politics; policy is by definition something concocted by some form of
elite, which presumes it knows better than others how their affairs are
to be conducted. By participating in policy debates the very best one
can achieve is to limit the damage, since the very premise is inimical
to the idea of people managing their own affairs.54

As a result, communities that concede their power to the state,
reduce their independence and freedom to determine the type of society
they want to live in.

The relinquishing of community power to a state government is
unnecessary because there is no reason to believe the state can perform
better than the community could. Anarchists believe we are capable of
practicing a natural form of justice amongst ourselves, based on our
conscience and innate ability to reason with one another, without
trusting the process to a hierarchical ruling class of professionals.
Kropotkin explains the manipulative justification for law by saying:

Its origin is the desire of the ruling class to give
permanence to customs imposed by themselves for their own advantage. Its
character is the skilful commingling of customs useful to society,
customs which have no need of law to insure respect, with other customs
useful only to rulers, injurious to the mass of the people, and
maintained only by the fear of punishment.55

The anarchist belief equates “law” with ethics, and reasons that
since we learn ethics from our families, friends, and other members of
our community, our current governmental legal system is not required.
The permanence of a state authority comes under further questioning when its actual existence is probed. Graeber writes:

In fact, the world is under no obligation to live up to
our expectations, and insofar as “reality” refers to anything, it refers
to precisely that which can never be entirely encompassed by our
imaginative constructions. Totalities, in particular, are always
creatures of the imagination. Nations, societies, ideologies, closed
systems… none of these really exist. [...]

This is not an appeal for a flat-out rejection of such imaginary
totalities … It is an appeal to always bear in mind that they are just
that: tools of thought.56

Thus, part of the state’s existence and legitimacy is due to the
mental recognition we assign to it. If everyone were to shift their
thinking to a worldview in which the state was undesired, and instead,
looked to live without its authority, the state’s power and existence
would be critically undermined.
The primary reason we acknowledge the authority of the
state is its ability to use force as a means of enforcing compliance.
This means anyone who breaks the law can have their liberty taken from
them, or be killed by state officials. Sociologist Max Weber, describes
the state as, “ a human community that (successfully) claims the
monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given
territory.”57 On the issue of force and violence, Graeber writes:

… violence, particularly structural violence, where all
the power is on one side, creates ignorance. If you have the power to
hit people over the head whenever you want, you don’t have to trouble
yourself too much figuring out what they think is going on, and
therefore, generally speaking, you don’t. Hence the sure-fire way to
simplify social arrangements, to ignore the incredibly complex play of
perspectives, passions, insights, desires, and mutual understandings
that human life is really made of, is to make a rule and threaten to
attack anyone who breaks it. This is why violence has always been the
favored recourse of the stupid: it is the one form of stupidity to which
it is almost impossible to come up with an intelligent response. It is
also of course the basis of the state.58

Consequently, the manner in which we allow the state to enforce
compliance to the law is comparable to the rhetoric the American
government uses to demonize “terrorist” groups and the countries labeled
as their supporters. If terrorism is something we collectively
admonish, our next step is to be honest in our introspection, and
overcome the glaring contradiction that surrounds us.

Despite the state’s monopoly on the use of legitimate force, it
still only exists because we acknowledge it to. To live in a truly
cooperative and free society, we must be willing to let go of our
reliance on the external state and legal system, and begin to engage
each other on a local basis, and take full responsibility for the
structure of our communities and neighborhoods.

A new way forward — a restorative approach to justice

The current legal system’s fundamental purpose is to resolve
conflict. However, the power to determine resolutions is given to
individuals that do not have an interest in the matter, and prevent the
individuals involved to determine their own form of justice.
Additionally, obedience to this system is enforced under duress. Rather
than using force to achieve compliance, the anarchist approach to
resolving conflict is voluntary, and believes justice can only be
determined by the involved parties through dialogue. A justice system
based on these principles exists, and is called restorative justice.

Restorative justice is a form of conflict resolution, used by
different indigenous groups throughout the world, to settle disputes
between individuals. According to a restorative justice co-director of
facilitation, Matthew Johnson, “[r]eliance on the state to achieve
justice or security goes against the idea that people are fully equipped
to deal with their own conflicts — an idea that is at the core of
restorative justice principles.”59
In contrast to the current criminal justice system, where the state is
viewed as the primary victim in criminal acts, and victims, offenders,
and the community are given passive roles, restorative justice views
crime as being directed against individual people.60)
This means conflicts and disputes are settled entirely by members of
the community. The framework restorative justice uses, allows it to be
applied in any circumstance in which a conflict is deemed to exist. At
its core, it is a form of community justice that recognizes the
interconnectedness of communal living, and that harm and conflicts are
symptoms of communal inadequacies. Therefore, if everyone’s needs are
being met, then consequently the causes for conflict are prevented.

Howard Zehr, a leading advocate and visionary for restorative
justice, says that it has three primary pillars: harms and needs,
obligations, and engagement.61
In regards to harm, Zehr writes, “[w]hile our first concern must be
the harm experienced by victims, the focus on harm implies that we also
need to be concerned about the harm experienced by offenders and
communities.”62
The restorative approach tries to uncover the causes of conflicts in a
manner that respects the perspectives of the people involved. Behind
this is the belief that conflicts are created by misunderstandings and
needs not being met for individuals. This method prevents individuals
that have caused harm from being vilified, which encourages others to
participate, and also reveals any inadequacies within the individual’s
community.

The second pillar is that restorative justice “emphasizes offender accountability and responsibility.”63
This means, rather than sending offenders to jail, they confront the
people that have been harmed by their actions, and take responsibility
for rectifying the situation. Offenders are permitted to tell their side
of the story, but must also listen to how and why their actions led to
the harm. Then together, the individuals work towards an agreeable
solution. All this fits within the third pillar of engagement, which
suggests that the primary parties affected by crime be given significant
roles in the justice process.64 An example of how the process works is as follows:

We [an organization that coordinates restorative justice
conferences] would get a referral, call each principal actor in the
conflict, interview them carefully and empathetically…making sure they
are aware of the process as well as their own feelings…and get their
consent to participate in the process. We would then repeat the process
with everyone else involved and schedule a time that worked for everyone
and an appropriate, neutral location. If it were a Victim-Offender
Dialogue, it would likely take place at the correctional institution.
The preparation process, where a trained facilitator would talk to each
person individually, is generally the most important part and will
determine the success of the conference. At the end of the conference,
dialogue, etc., the facilitator(s) would help the participants generate a
consensus agreement, that might include restitution, an apology,
community service, etc., and follow up with participants after an
established amount of time to ensure that they were satisfied with the
agreement and that it was being followed as agreed.65

Restorative justice practices are gaining traction and
being applied throughout the country in a variety of contexts, but its
success and continued use is dependent upon a continuing shift in
societal values, and the strengthening of communal ties.66
In some instances, forms of restorative justice are being used in
conjunction with the criminal justice system for misdemeanor crimes.
Defendants are given the choice of pleading guilty and going through a
process in which they admit guilt, and discuss what caused them to
commit the crime, and are then required to perform community service.
While this is a step in the right direction, the process still operates
under the power of the state. Additionally, it creates a problematic
incentive for defendants to plead guilty to crimes just to escape
accountability. Accountability is important in ensuring justice through
the restorative method, however, without the force of the state to
ensure this, the question becomes, how can society hold people
accountable for their actions? Matthew Johnson believes:

… that accountability comes naturally with community and
interdependent relationships. We tend to not view ourselves as connected
in Western culture; we see ourselves primarily as individuals. In this
context, accountability is not as important as escaping blame or harm.
However, if I value my relationship with you more than my own
willingness to avoid pain/consequences, I will tell you that I broke
your favorite possession, etc., because I would want the same done for
me, and we are interconnected. Also, accountability comes much easier
when there is no expectation of punishment. If I knew you weren’t going
to sue me, hit me, or shun me for admitting my wrongdoing, I would have
much more of an incentive to tell the truth and be accountable. The
current criminal justice system, along with the capitalist economic
system, assumes that we act within our own self-interests, and this is
just the way of things. Therefore, we incentive behavior that maximizes
self-interest. Yet we turn around and criticize people for being
selfish, etc. The principles of restorative justice go against this
paradigm. Its practitioners have a much less cynical view of humanity,
but nonetheless it’s quite possible that RJ (restorative justice) won’t
reach its full potential without a radical re-evaluation of societal
values.65

Thus, in order for restorative justice to operate in the anarchist
fashion it is intended to, and be successful, there needs to be an
evolution in the way we live our lives, and the way we view one another.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the racist, classist, hierarchical interests
represented in the formation of the Constitution have created a legal
system, and subsequently, a criminal justice system, that has
consistently failed to administer true justice. Thus, a new approach
must be taken, which will require us to stop relying on the current
criminal justice system, and its oppressive laws to solve our
interpersonal issues. The criminal justice system will continue to work
the way it has, as long as we continue to consent and participate in it.
If we collectively take a stand and withdraw our consent from the
system, and instead redirect how we deal with conflict to a restorative
approach, the criminal justice system will become irrelevant. In
explaining “revolutionary exodus,” David Graeber writes:

The theory of exodus proposes that the most effective way of opposing
capitalism and the liberal state is not through direct confrontation
but by means of what Paolo Virno has called “engaged withdrawal,” mass
defection by those wishing to create new forms of community. One need
only glance at the historical record to confirm that most successful
forms of popular resistance have taken precisely this form. They have
not involved challenging power head on (this usually leads to being
slaughtered, or if not, turning into some—often even uglier—variant of
the very thing one first challenged) but from one or another strategy of
slipping away from its grasp, from flight, desertion, the founding of
new communities.67
Critical for creating this new society is a belief that it is possible and that we have the power to do it.
It is time to reaffirm what is already ours and reclaim our
individual sovereignty. It is time for our self ownership to be
reaffirmed and lived out in life. It is a metaphysical fact that we own
our bodies and minds. All other ownerships can be challenged and are
transitory at best, but self ownership is undeniable and permanent as
long as we are living beings. Therefore it is ultimately, indeed must be
our decision as to how we will conduct our lives the only law that we
must accept is to do no harm to others and to recognize and respect the
personal sovereignty of the other as they must ours. Recognition and
respect of every person’s individual sovereignty is the only way in
which systems of mutual cooperation can be successfully developed and
maintained. And indeed is the only law required for peaceful coexistence
with the greater society. But it is not a law of compulsion like most
laws, but is rather the natural state of things such as the laws of
physics.68

President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society, 7, (1967). [↩]

Mark
S. Umbreit and Betty Vos and Robert B. Coates and Elizabeth Lightfoot,
Restorative Justice In the twenty-first century: A social movement full
of opportunities and pitfalls, 89 Marq. L. Rev. 251, 255
(2005). (This article provides a comprehensive breakdown of the variety
of restorative justice models and their impact. [↩]